Alex McLeish Sacked By Aston Villa – Pwarp Pwarp Pwaaaarp

After 11 months of plop, it’s now officially ‘game over’ for Alex McLeish at Aston Villa – and if that news surprises you in any way then may we be the first to congratulate you on getting through your first week here on Earth unscathed.

Watching him idly clapping the Villa fans while being barraged with a hearty rendition of ‘Sack McLeish, My Lord’ after losing to Norwich on the final day of the season, you kind of got the inkling that his ‘meeting with the owners’ the following day wasn’t going to go particularly well. A 16th-place finish, two points above relegation with the highest draw rate (43%) and the lowest goals-per-game rate (0.96) in the Premier League this season probably didn’t help either.

We hear that the announcement would’ve been made sooner were Villa not waiting for McLeish to clear out his desk at Bodymoor Heath. The delay was caused due to a massive surplus of drawers. Drawers? Draws? Geddit?

‘Badum’ and indeed ’tish’.

Aaaaanyway. Like a pallid Glaswegian day-walker feeding on West Midlands club’s lifeblood, Eck has gradually sucked all of the effervescence out of Villa (Pies hate to say we told you so but…we bloody well did!) and the penchant for conservative tactics only got worse as their wretched season went on. They gradually went down through the spectrum from defensive counter-attacking football, to focusing solely on nullifying their opponents, to all-out ‘Heskey up front on his own’ 0-0 preservation over the course of ten months. Not the kind of thing that fans usually take too warmly to.

Who’s next for Villa? Well, we’ll have a shilling on Roberto Martinez and Paul Lambert receiving calls from Randy sooner rather than later. Whether either will budge is another matter.

15Comments

If I was Paul Lambert i’d be sorely tempted to take that job. He’s proven himself to be one of the finest talents in the country with back to back promotions, and then an incredible mid-table finish in the Premiership for a club that most people thought were nailed on relegation candidates.
But even he must be wondering what more he can do there on a very limited budget and second season syndrome just round the corner. Villa, in spite of being the dullest club in the Premier League are definite under achievers, and offer quite a nice opportunity for the next stage of his career. Beyond relegation, they can’t do any worse and so any manager that can get them back up the table a bit really has the opportunity to cement their credentials in the big leagues. Lerner may even give a bit of backing financially and give him the opportunity to push on for a tilt at the minor European slots.
Personally, anything that makes them even slightly more attractive means that I won’t have to turn Match of the Day off 10 minutes before the finish.

@ Nick – I reckon thats what Owen Coyle was thinking when he left Burnley and it doidn’t go to well, if I was lambert I wouldn’t touch the Villa job with barge pole, if he can build on this season with Norwich and consolidate them as a Premier club he would be in line for a bigger job in a few years

@ Chris – you may have got the Mcleish prediction right in the old article rferenced but some of the other predictions were woeful, Chelsea champs, Liverpool 4th, Torres to bang in the goals, chuckle chuckle chuckle

Thank fuck for that! Villa originally didn’t appoint McClaren because of the poor response of the fans, and then didn’t go for Hughes because of the way he conducted himself in leaving Fulham. Hence the Villa board decided to appoint someone who matched both criteria… It was an idiotic appointment in the first place, did the board just appoint him to spite the fans!?

Relief all round that the season’s over and the ginger ninja has gone.I’ve enjoyed this season less than 1986-87 & we DID get relegated that time. If mid-table is enough for the owners (seriously we will not challenge the big hitters) then let’s play some decent football. Next man up…no-one who used to be a centre half please. A 4 year plan to build a proper team in the image of a young progressive coach would be cool. So not Rafa then. Mcleish was worse than Graham Turner and Doctor Jo, but not as bad as Billy McNeill who got 2 teams relegated in 1987. Come on you villa boys.

Interesting go back and read Pies’ predictions for the 2011-2012 season.

Dead right that McLeish would lead Tottenham to defensiveness and failure, and that RVP would win scoring title and that Tevez would return to EPL (though the last only required the hardly-shocking realization that Mancini has the scruples of a politician).

Dead wrong on predictions for Chelsea to win EPL, Liverpool to push Arsenal out of top four (mostly thanks to Downing and Carroll), Kean to be fired by October (though your prediction would have been better than what Blackburn actually chose to do), that Torres would score a lot of goals and that Norwich, QPR and Wigan would go down (though admittedly close on two of the three). Pretty well wrong on prediction that Everton to start well – 2 wins, a draw and 7 losses does not a good start make (though not abnormally horrible by Everton standards).

Half credit for prediction that top four would be Chelsea, Man U, City and Liverpool.